Perhaps it’s a sad indictment of how Joe & Jo Public regard the estate agency profession.

But I do get frustrated when I try, whilst keeping a watchful eye on my responsibilities under the headings Best Practice and Codes Of Conduct, to give honest straightforward advice, only for the recipient of my intended helpfulness to try to double-guess what I really mean.

I mean what I say, and I say what I mean.

Take today, for example: two people after the same property, one offers more than other. I discuss the situation with my client, the vendor: he’s inclined to accept the higher offer because it’s at the asking price.

However, he allows me to contact the lower bidder to give them an opportunity to increase. “Maybe they’ll match the higher bid”, he thinks. “At least they should be given the chance”, I think.

“Sorry, I’m not permitted to divulge what the other people have offered”, I explain to them, “but I can confirm their offer is higher than yours.”

Then, in truth, I probably overstepped the mark in terms of what I should say next:

“Look, if you’re really keen on the property, and I think you are, I would suggest that you need to be offering at least the asking price in order to have a chance of securing it.

“Pardon? Did I hear that correctly? You want to offer below the asking price to see what happens?”

Were they not listening or do they automatically disbelieve what I say? Sadly, I know what reaction I’ll get tomorrow when I say they’ve lost the house because they’ve been outbid:

“Oh, that’s so unfair! We would have offered the asking price. We’d have probably offered more. Etc etc”

Contact us

Follow us

About us

Family-run Estate Agents serving the whole of Bristol... and beyond. Residential sales, lettings & tenancy management and property auctions. We are the exclusive West Country agents for Network-E online auctions